Why are we obsessed with bad hip hop?

And for the record, this isn’t the start of another big bad rant on the state of hip hop today. I’ve written many pieces on just how much I hate Lil’ Wayne, or just where Kanye can stick those shuttershades. I’ve railed against the terrible styles of G-unit and passed more than my fair share of judgment in general.

I’m writing this more about truly bad hip hop. Songs that are not well done, clearly amateur, and pretty much embarassing. This hip hop schadenfreude seems to follow the general trend in society where we all are tremendously amused by people trying and failing to perform well. There’s a reason why those American Idol “outtakes” episodes are so popular.

Consider this the hip-hop equivalent of When Animals Attack!, or World’s Deadliest Lawnmower Accidents or whatever else is on Spike-TV these days. People love watching others suck at something. It’s human nature, or so it seems. There are countless examples of this. In fact, it’s pretty much the only way to explain why ANYONE knows who William Hung was.

The latest example taking the web by storm is It’s so cold in the D. A track recorded by a Detroit rapped calling herself T-Baby, better known as LaTonya Myles. And it started off as a rather touching tribute for a friend of the rapper. Mason Graham was shot and killed back in 2006, and so she wanted to do something to remember him.

Sounds nice enough. But obviously the internet didn’t take too kindly to it. The video (you can see it below) has grabbed over a million views on YouTube so far. And yet the response has been so negative it actually hurts. Almost like 2 Girls 1 Cup, people record themselves reacting to this video and then post it. Mainly it’s laughter, sometimes it’s horror.

This is only the latest example of these things, but I guarantee you by the time this article gets taken down, there will be something else ready to replace it. And we here at 4080 are just as guilty of it as you are. In fact, we’ll probably be the ones who bring it to your attention first of all.